1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to fingernail clippers and more particularly to such clipper which are for trimming artificial nails attached to natural fingernails.
2. Description of the Related Art
Artificial nails, such as acrylic artificial nails, attach to a wearer's natural fingernails and are thereafter cut, filed, painted, and buffed. Artificial nails are typically longer and thicker than the wearer's natural nails. Application of a full set of artificial nails can be a time consuming process.
Prior art clippers for artificial nails are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,856,190 to Reiswig for a single cut clipper for artificial nails; U.S. Pat. No. 5,065,513 to Reiswig for an artificial fingernail clipper and U.S. Pat. No. 5,357,676 to Bannett for a nail blunt clipper. Clippers of the type shown in the prior art Reiswig patents include a substantially planar nail holder having an aperture therethrough. A substantially planar blade including a cutting edge, slides over the aperture for cutting an artificial nail inserted in the aperture. Prior art clippers suffer from a number of deficiencies. Such clippers includes a body having a first handle formed thereon and a second handle permanently attached to the body. Prior art clippers are made of metal and the handles are not particularly easy to grasp or squeeze. In the prior art clippers, the blade includes an elongate slot having a separate spacer received therein. The spacer is mounted on the nail holder with a screw which passes through a bore in the spacer and is engaged with a threaded bore in the nail holder. The spacer must be removed and replaced every time a blade is changed or sharpened. This requires a screwdriver and a fair amount of manual dexterity to properly place the spacer in the slot and screw it onto the nail holder. Also, the spacer tends to twist and bind against the sides of the slot formed in the blade making blade travel more or less difficult depending upon how much torque has been applied to the screw mounting the spacer.
The body, handles and mechanism for sliding the blade in the Reiswig '190 clipper is substantially identical to the mechanism disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,838,507 to Clark for an animal nail clipper. The linkage for connecting one of the handles to the blade in the Reiswig '513 patent is also similar to that used in the Clark animal nail clipper. In both the Reiswig clippers, a portion of the blade slot is received in a notch formed in the metal handle. This contributes to difficulty in changing blades and does not provide smooth and easy blade travel responsive to squeezing the handles together.
Prior art blades are either curved or have a straight blade edge oriented substantially 90.degree. to the direction of blade travel. This makes cutting more difficult than if the nail was cut at an angle and also results in a less smooth edge when cutting is complete.
It would be desireable to provide an artificial nail clipper which overcomes the above-enumerated disadvantages associated with prior art clippers.